Horizons

SEVEN

WAKING IN HER FIRST CLASS RECLINER ON THE NORTH American Alliance’s climber, Ahni winced at her stomach’s instant protest. On day five, they had passed from Earth’s gravitational tyranny to the sense that gravity wasn’t such a tyrant after all. Two young children traveling from Toronto with their parents, had spent the last day entertaining all with their hands-on exploration of their diminishing weight and its limits. Smiling in spite of bruises, they made everyone smile.

Ahni tried to enjoy their antics, but her anxiety over what awaited her on NYUp oppressed her. Her mother had commanded herr to return, then pleaded. Not once would she admit that she had known Xai was alive when Ahni gave her the news. That was a lie and it made Ahni wonder what other lies hid here.

It would be dangerous to face her brother, but by now, he must know that she had not revealed his presence to their father. He would be curious and curiosity had always been his weakness. With luck, he would reveal glimpse of the larger picture she knew lay behind these small lies.

Her mother had, at least, ceased calling her. Through a crack in the privacy curtain which enclosed her First Class recliner, Ahni cught a glimpse of the two children, Donya and Kelly, swinging down the aisle between the curtained recliners, Tarzan-like, from handhold to handhold, pursued by the resigned attendant who probbably looked forward with longing to the arrival of the climber. Ahni checked the screen on the arm of her seat. Less than an hour to arrrival. She stretched, wrinkled her nose, wanting a long soak in the hotel in comforting gravity. And she wanted to see Dane againn–needed to talk to talk to him, wanted to see him. Revelation there. She smiled in spite of her worries.

“Hey, we’re gonna land soon.” A face thlust through the currtains, interrupting her thoughts.

Nine-year-old Donya grinned at her, the natural mix of North Mrican, Mediterranean, and Spanish genes a perfect blend in her oval face. “Kelly already has his spot staked out. And I know they’re not real windows, don’t you tell me, too.” She made a face.

“A window is something you look at to see the outside,” Ahni said gravely. “I call them windows.”

“Well, they are just a digital image,” the girl stated with a child’s solemn attention to getting the details right. “But I suppose your definition is broad enough so that you may call them windows.”

“It is. I was careful to make it so.” Ahni laughed and released the webbing that kept her safely in her seat. Gingerly she pulled herrself to the aisle sliding the curtain back along its guide rail, one hand on the hand grip. She noticed that Donya had already mastered the art of flying. She couldn’t match Koi, but she learned a whole lot faster than the adult passengers with their less-fluid inner ears who pulled themselves laboriously around the climber or clutched white knuckled at hand grips, their eyes glassy with anti-nausea drugs. They would appreciate that Level One gravity on the platforms.

“I looked at the welcome vid in the climber’s library.” Donya grabbed the guide rail to keep herself from flying past Ahni. “They have a really cool park. It’s in the center of the orbital and there’s no gravity, and people play all kinds of games there and race and — I can’t wait.” She ran out of breath finally.

Ahni spared a glance for Donya parents who belonged to the glassy-eyed white-knuckled set. “You’ll be living up here for a while, right?” Ahni joined her at one of the big “windows.” “So you’ll have plenty of time to find friends to go with you to the park.”

“You’re right. They won’t want to go.” She gave her parents a disappointed look and shrugged. “I wish it was going to be longer. I want to get good in no-gravity, shave my head, and get a lightfiber tatoo. Or do you have to be born up here to do that?”

“I think it’s just fashion.” Ahni smiled, thinking she and Koi would hit it off. “I never heard there was a law.”

“The Administrator has a tattoo. He’s quite dark and it looks really cool. We met him last year when Father brought us up here to see. Mama didn’t want to come up here to stay, but Father said it would ‘round out our life experience’ — one of those things parents say, you know? And I’m glad. I didn’t want to spend the winter in Montreal. Snow! Brr!” She shivered. “I miss Ankara but this will be so much more fun!”

Ahni smiled. The vid camera had shifted its view and now they seemed to be passing close to the matte black cannister that was NYUp, although the terminus of the Elevator was actually some distance away.

“Oh, look at the lights!” Donya crowed. She tried to bounce up and down and Ahni caught her as she rocketed away from the window, hauled her back.

Gripping the handhold beneath the window, she looked briefly up at Ahni. “I know you’re going to be very very busy up there, but if you don’t have anything to do sometime, and you want to go to the park—”

“I’ll call you.” Ahni smiled at her, distracted from her worry. This girl, child of an upperclass family who moved in global circles, had had no casual childhood, school, friends to hang around with. “I really will,” she assured Donya, who had put on a polite face that Ahni guessed was her response to adult lies.

THE FIRST CLASS section disembarked at the terminus, hauling themselves directly from their cabins to the shuttles that would take them to their destination with only the barest nod from Security. Most of them were headed for NYUp, although a few scattered to other shuttles. Donya kept up a bright commentary all the way, while her brother kept his eyes fixed on the vidscreens offering various views of the looming platform with its forest of solar arrays, telescopes, radar dishes, and all the other devices that cluttered its skin. The parents were clearly holding on to their stomachs.

Ahni finally saw the last of the irrepressible Donya in the Arrival Hall, as they passed through the First Class aisles and out into the plaza. Tired from her forced inactivity, the cramped sleeping space of the recliner, and her restless worries about Xai, Ahni followed the lavender arrows that lighted beneath her feet, leading her to her hotel

It wasn’t far from tlle Arrival Hall, so she didn’t bother to hire a cart, even though she had reclaimed her large suitcase and now lugged it along with her small bag slung over one shoulder. In the sub-Earth gravity, it wasn’t a particularly heavy load. But before she had passed more than a Tai Pei block down the busy corridor leaving from the Arrival Hall, she hesitated.

It… felt different here.

Normally, once she had the feel of a place, whether it was the family compound, the streets of Tai Pei, or a strange hotel, the emotional static from the people around her faded into a blur like white noise. Only the unexpected or extreme emotional spike stabbed her attention. So this time, barely two weeks away from the corridors, she should have felt at home.

She didn’t. A simmering–anger–tainted the air like the smell of burning wires. It wasn’t like this last time.

A uniformed woman carrying a static cleaning wand stepped around her with a flash irritation that startled Ahni as much as a slap would have done. The woman gave her a direct stare as she stalked past.

How rude. Ahni walked on, resolving to drop into Pause in her room and consider this change in mood up here. The sour tinge of anger in the air nagged at her as she followed the lavender arrow down the thickly carpeted aisle. The arrow led her left, then right, then vanished beneath the feet of a doorman with the muscular look of a gym rat and red hair braided into neat cornrows. He glanced at a wrist mounted link and leaped to take her bags, his wide amer-mix face fixed in a smile. “Welcome, Ms. Huang. Nice of you to stay with us this trip.” He hoisted the big bag as if it was filled with feathers. “I’ll show you your room. Is there anything you’d like? A massage? It helps after all those hours in one of those climber recliners. I think they were designed by chiropractors hungry for business.” Chatting on glibly, leaving just enough pause to allow herr to answer, but not so much that it was obvious that she wasn’t answering, he escorted her through the doorway.

It led to a small square plaza. Ahni stopped still, startled by the vista of blue sky and puffy clouds overhead. A trio of birds winged across it, vanishing into a belt of trees beyond green lawn and a distant brook. Beneath her feet, grass carpet so real that she stifled the urge to lean down and touch it enticed her to that distant stream.

“Pretty realistic isn’t it?” Her guide laughed. “It helps the visitors who have claustrophobia problems.”

”No kidding.” Ahni laughed, too. Yes, it was a ceiling, not endless sky, and you could just make out the line where the grass carpet met the rolling lawn of the virtual landscape. Nice projection, she thought.

Very dimensional. Top of the line software and hardware both. Rustic white fences — real ones — kept patrons from walking into the walls.

“This is your suite.” He led her across the “grass” to a door in what seemed to be a neat row of small cottages. More projections. With a flourish he palmed the lock and threw the door open.”Now I’ve opened it, it won’t respond to my hand anymore. If you’ll just stand here a second,” he indicated a faintly darker circle in the carpet, “the vitals scanner will record you and then the room will take your personal security from there.”

Ahni stepped onto the dark carpet and imagined that she could feel the Security program recording her bioelectric field, her image, body temp, muscle synergy. It would now recognize her without further ID.

The room itself was of typical Hong Kong or Tai Pei size, she decided, small for American or European hotels. A single room, the sofa converted to a bed. A table and two luxurious chairs took up the rest of the floor. Drawers and a closet lined one wall, entertainment screen and holodesk the other. A refreshment panel and the door to a private bathroom filled the other wall. An enormous vase of white lilies and pink orchids stood on the single, small table.

”The controls.” With a flourish, the man touched a watercolor of a grassy valley and it shimmered into a control screen.”There’s a separate one in the bathroom for the functions there. Window —” He touched the screen and instantly the entertainment wall vanished, showing her blackness and the scattered diamond dust of a million stars

Ahni stilled an urge to grab for something solid, as if she might be sucked out into that freezing, beautiful void. “Nice,” she said dryly. “How often do you have to get out the defib?”

The doorman chuckled. This was clearly his private perk, his little test of his visitors. “Good reaction,” he murmured.

Ahni merely scanned the control panel. “Everything else looks pretty routine. I think I can find my way around the bathroom, thanks.” She slipped a cash card out of her pocket, handed it to him. The LCD displayed the amount on the front.

“Thank you, ma’am.” He grinned. “If there’s anything you want—”

“Did the hotel provide the flowers?”

He looked at them as if he had just noticed them, eyebrow rising. “I don’t think so, ma’am. Doesn’t look like our usual supplier. I could try to find out.”

“Please do.” She smiled at him.

He bowed his head to her. “Right away, ma’am.”

Ahni closed the door behind him. Quite the step up from the little cheapie hotel on the main corridor she had booked last trip. Cautiously, Ahni walked over to the table, circled it, staring at the flowers. Her assiduous doorman had placed her bags on a wide shelf in the closet, leaving the sliding doors open. She retrieved a small handheld security scanner from it, checked the flowers. No contact toxins, explosives, hardware of any sort. Just flowers. No card. Xai?

She leaned close. The scent of the lilies pervaded, but a delicate trace of rotting meat threaded the flowery sweetness. This particular species of orchid depended on carrion flies for pollination. Bemused she straightened. Sweetness and rot. A comment? Warning? She touched one creamy lily petal, its flesh crisp and fresh beneth her fingertip. Grown here? In Dane’s kingdom? She turned her back on them, touched open her suitcase and surveyed the contents Fan had helped her pack. Time to go make herself available. And to watch her back. She smiled, mirthlessly.

SHE DRESSED IN the “orbital chic” she had seen in the corriidors, loose and elegant. Out in the corridors, she sauntered along, looking as curious and mildly bored as the genuine tourists she had noted.

The main corridors here were wide, crammed with shallow shop fronts, vendor carts, and strolling tourists. Ahni pretended interest in the same styles and designers you could get for the same price on Earth. That undercurrent of anger nagged at her. She shook her head at the skinny little androgyne, intricately tattooed with light, who offered her faceted pieces of polished gemmstones set in hairfine wire.

Then she looked twice, because he… she… reminded her of Koi. Ahni bought a skewer of fresh fruit chunks from a native-boned girl with wise eyes in a gamine face. For all her nonchalance, Ahni kept her awareness honed, searching for an echo of Xai. She needed to contact Dane, too. Her surge of anticipation was–revelatory. Maybe he could see a pattern in Xai’s actions.

She entered a shop selling spider silk clothing, fingering the delicate tissues of gold, soft green, peacock blue, and rich crimson that hung on the racks or draped artistically about surrealistic mannequins seemingly carved from ice. The shopkeeper, a round-face mixedeuro with blonde hair and fair northern skin, followed her, her manner a perfect blend of helpful and polite, her eagerness hummming behind her careful unobtrusiveness. “I like this color.” Ahni selected a fitted blouse with short, loose sleeves in a soft green and gold flower pattern that made her think of the axle garden.

“It suits your skin tones. Visiting from China?” The woman led her to a mirror and a shimmering privacy curtain instantly surrrounded them in the tiny shop. “Do try it on.” The shopkeeper withdrew to the other side of the privacy curtain. “This style flatters your figure.”

“I will try it on.” Ahni smiled at the woman’s adept sales techhnique. “I’m from Taiwan. This is my first visit up here.” As herself anyway. She stripped her singlesuit down to her waist and pulled on the top. It had a slight stretch and the woman was right. The fitted waist and loose sleeves, ending well above her elbows did flatter her boyish figure. It would work in microG, too. She bought it, and a pair of loose formal pants to go with it, chatting with the woman about affairs downside and up here.

“A bunch of folk want to see us go independent.” The shoppkeeper looked down at the clothes as she folded them. “They’re crazy. How could we get along up here? I mean… I came up here because I could own a shop and it was just… there was too much red tape in Lucerne if you wanted to start a new store. You had to wait until someone gave up a place and the waiting list—” She shook her head. “I do okay up here, but how does NOW expect us to survive if the tourists stop coming? They’re crazy.

Downsiders don’t all look down on us. But that’s all you get on the Con these days.” She flushed, smoothed the folded silk she’d wrinkled. “Let me bag these for you. I didn’t mean to be bothering you with our silly local politics.”

“What’s the Con?” Ahni eyeballed the charge screen as the woman slipped the clothes into a bright bag.

“Oh, it’s just a local thing.” The woman laughed a bit awkwardly. “Sort of an ongoing gossip session–but everyone does it all the time. It’s kind of a mess if you’re not used to it. People just talking about their day.”

That’s right. Noah worked on it. Traffic cop, he had said, or something like that. Ahni thanked her and left the shop, continuing her aimless tourist wandering. No tours to the garden, although the park Donya had mentioned advertised a view wall into it. On a whim, she took an elevator upward a few of levels.

This particular elevator let her out in a retail area, one that obviously didn’t cater to tourists. No angles.

Walls, floor, ceiling curved into one another. The shops offered basics and a few luxury items. And she didn’t beelong here. Ahni’s skin priclded with attention as she wandered among the natives, stepping carefully because she felt as if she had springs on her feet. Most of the natives didn’t look at her, but here and there, someone stared rudely.

She pretended not to notice them. Maybe she’d made a mistake. Unobtrusively she scanned the pale mauve arch of corridor, looking for security eyes. Saw a few, not many. Meanwhile, she noticed that two men and a woman were following her. They stared at her. Ahni stifled a prickle of apprehension. They were between her and the elevator plaza. Ahead of her, the corridor widened into what seemed to be a small park.

Grass-carpeted space offered complex climbing equipment for children and a scatter of natives sat or sprawled on the carpet, alone or in small groups, eating, looking at readers, watching small portable holodesks, or listening to music. Some had stripped naked in the summer-afternoon light that filled the space and splashed under a towering fountain that seemed to fall back to the pool in slow motion droplets, curving a bit from the spin of the platform. Behind her, her shadows closed in.

Ahni headed for the center of the park. Here, strolling vendors sold food from backpacks, mostly cold sandwiches and stuffed buns of various types, or poured beverages from shoulder-carried plastic jugs into mugs that natives wore clipped to their belts. One vendor with pale skin and a buzz of black hair looked vaguely familiar. Ahni drifted closer, watching him plant the single pole leg of the grill on the carpeted floor, brace it with one foot, and stir fry a handful of mixed vegetables and tofu for a customer, tossing the food high with a drama that could never work in full Earth gravity. With a flourish, he scooped the hot stir-fry into a rolled cone of thin flatbread, fished a squeeze from his pack, squirted sauce onto the veggies, and handed it to the buyer in return for a couple of small, bright orange disks.

A fiberlight inlay on his wrist, a green Celtic design confirmed er recognition. “Noah?”

He looked up, grinned, his manner easy, pleased. “Hey, Ahni. How cool. I just got back last night.” He offered her a hand. “Wow, what a ride back up! Privacy and everything. Thanks a lot.” His hand closed briefly about her wrist, and tense as she was, she almost knocked it away.

“You don’t want to shake like a heavy–like a downsider. Here.” He grabbed her wrist firmly, his little grill leaning safely to the side. “You grab mine. Like that.” He nodded as her fingers closed around his skinny wrist.

“Good job.” He squeezed her wrist hard, let go. “Now you shake like an upsider.” His grin widened.

“”Cept your muscles give you away. Too thick, even for a gym rat.”

Her shadows had vanished. “Noah, do you mind walking back to the elevator with me?” She smiled up at him. “Do you have a couple of minutes?”

“It’s right over there.” He gestured with his chin.”You lost?”

”No.” She started to put a hand on his arm, stopped, because she realized that she hadn’t seen any natives touch one another in the corridors. His eyes darkened and narrowed as she told him about her shadows and their intent.

“I’d say you were mistaken, ‘cause that kind of thing never used to happen. But lately—” He shook his head, wiped his grill down with a cloth, slung it over his shoulder with his pack. “Where are you headed?”

“Back to my hotel room. It’s on the skinside level, so a convoy to the elevator is all I need.”

Without a word, Noah took her arm. It had the feel of an immportant gesture and again, Ahni felt attention. Bemused she walked with him to the elevator, unsteady because he moved a lot faster than her coordination would have let her do. “Door-to-door service.” He winked as he followed her inside.

“You didn’t stay down long,” she said as they dropped.

”No.” He bit off the word. “I didn’t… impress my grandfather. And…” He lifted one shoulder. “I needed to get back up here fast.”

“Do you see Dane often?”

”Yeah.” Noah followed her out of the car. “All the time, why?”

“I’m not sure how to get in touch with him. Informally, I mean. I couldn’t find his name in the access directory.”

“Probably not.” Noah laughed. “I’ll tell him.”

“Thanks.” She didn’t want to draw any more attention to Koi and his family by sneaking up to the axle again. Someone might notice.

“Thank you,” Ahni said, as they came within sight of the doorman, a different one this time. His flicker of instant disapproval tickled her. “Noah, what did it mean? That you took my arm up there?”

”Nothing–Well, no, that’s not true.” He blushed.”Itmeans… you’re my friend. Just so… people up in the neighborrhood know.”

“Thanks.” She smiled. “I appreciate it.”

“I work the mealtime crowds when I’m off. A little extra to add to my regular pay.” His smile gleamed in his eyes. “Come on back up and I’ll show you how to play scrum.” His eyes dimmed briefly. “I’m sorry about those jerks. The Con has gotten nasty. Dane thinks it’s hackers, but I don’t know.” He shook his head. “You probably shouldn’t go wandering around on the upper levels right now by yourself. But my neighborhood’s safe now, so come back up, okay?”

“It’s a deal.” She smiled and he walked away with a flip of his fingers that she translated as a wave.

Her room door opened at her approach. Lights glowed on as she stepped over the threshold and the scent of the lilies almost made her dizzy. You have an urgent message, the room told her in a gentle female voice. Would you like to hear it?

“Yes!”

Ms. Huang, my greetings! I’m Laif Jones-Egret, the Administrator for NYUp. I’m honored to have a premier member of the Taiwan Families as a visitor to the platform, and I’d like to extend an invitation to you for dinner. If you have no plans, I’d be honored by your attendance toonight at 700 hours. If you’d like me to call for you, fust say ‘yes’. I hope you can make it!

Intrigue or protocol? Ahni tossed her bag full of spider silk dress up onto the bed. ‘Yes,’ she said clearly.

Two hours to prepare. Plenty of time.

Wonderful!His recorded answer sounded almost real. You’ll find a cart and driver at your door at 700 hours on the nose! And with that quaint turn of phrase the message ended.

Something had certainly started happening up here in the week that she had been away. Her hindbrain tickled her with the suggesstion that it involved Xai.

Proof?

None. She needed to talk to Dane. Ahni explored the bathroom. It was adequate–shower stall, double sink, mirrors, dryer vents. The wall dispenser in the shower offered her usual shampoo and conditioner, the brand to be found in her personal file along with the toothpaste she preferred, the type of breakfast she favored, and her favorite colors. Sometimes she thought that a hotel database held more personal information than a Council Security Force snoop file. She turned the shower on full and hot, the six sprays swiveling to evenly bombard her body with water.

It felt… strange in slightly diminished gravity. Water didn’t behave normally. But the heat and steam relaxed her and she deecided to find a bathhouse where she could pay for a good long soak tomorrow.

She found the refreshment wall stocked with her preferred brands of tea and ordered a pot. The pale liquor soothed her as she took her time dressing. First impressions had value. From the tone of the message, she guessed that this Administrator was waiting to be impressed. She would not disappoint him, she thought as she put on the spider silk evening pants and top, then donned a lacy cap of silver beadwork hung with strings of pale jade that drew attenntion to her fine-boned face and slender neck.

She finished a careful job of makeup just before 700, and not five minutes later, the room voice spoke to her. Ms. Huang, a private car is waiting for you. Would you like to reply?

“I’ll be right there,” she said, slipped on a pair of real-leather sandals and left the room.

One of the little electric cars she had noticed in the corridors waited outside the gate to the inner courtyard. A small, native-boned woman with an unselect-hispanic face sat at the controls. She smiled at Ahni, nodded approval. “You look great.” She patted the twin facing seats behind her perch. “It’s all yours tonight, help yourself. I’m Doria.”

“Ahni.” She seated herself facing forward, relieved at the friendly greeting. “So where are we going?” she asked lightly as the car surged forward with a subdued whine from it’s electric motor. “The governor’s mansion?”

The woman clearly didn’t get that reference

“To the Administrator’s official residence?” Ahni amended. “Sort of.” Doria grinned, weaving the little cart through the increasingly crowded corridor with deft precision. “It’s sort of the official hall. Sometimes guests have dinner there, sometimes we have work parties there.” Her grin widened. “Sometimes we just party there. Like on Christmas and New Year’s, and E Day. That’s Elevator Day, the day the first climber hit the platform. That really was the start of the orbitals as a place to live I guess. That was a long time ago. I think my grandmother was a little girl then, or maybe not even born yet.” She shrugged and cranked the little cart around a tourist group spread out across the corridor, kids darting about, moms hurrying belatedly after them. Doria shook her head, irritaation tarnishing her bright mood. “They just don’t get it — that we have to go places, that this corridor isn’t just for them.”

Doria guided the little cart into a doorway large enough to addmit it. The double doors whisked sideways, revealing a tiled atrium decorated with rocks and water. Perhaps ten people stood around the tiny, splashing fountain, drinks in hand, the air already thick with cocktail hour levity veneered over purpose.

“Ah, Ms. Huang.” A very tall man with a mixed afro-amerind face separated himself from a pair of women and strode to meet her, light fiber tracery glowing on his scalp, a huge emerald glitterring in one ear. “I’m so pleased that you accepted my invitation.”

“I would hardly say no.” Ahni took his hand–like a downsider would–and let him help her climb out of the cart. He was big. She had seen his image on the media, but there had been no point of reference to prepare her for someone that tall. Tall, big… he didn’t seem to fit up here. She looked up… up… met dark twinkling eyes, and an easy smile that did an excellent job of masking his very intent focus and an edge of tension. Uh oh. The name Huang meant something. “Do you invite all new visitors to dinner?

How very welcoming.”

“Oh, he rarely invites us downsiders to much of anything.” A small, stocky woman with spiked purple hair and out of fashion cheek and eyebrow art sashayed up with a half -empty drink in her hand. “I haven’t been able to pry the real reason for this red carpet unrolling out of him. Why don’t we join forces?” She looked Ahni up and down, her lust like the moist lick of a tongue on Ahni’s skin. “I think he’s gathering the faithful in the face of the oncoming storm.”

She was drunk:. “What storm is that,” Ahni asked politely.

“What can I get you to drink? Wine, liquor, one of the euphorics?” The Administrator steered her away from Spike Hair. “The bar is well stocked. We have juices, too, if you’d prefer. Fresh.”

“I’d like to try one of the local beers.” She had done her homwork. “I’ll try your local brandy another time, thank you.”

“Light? Dark?” One eyebrow rose. “We have a nice IPA.”

“I’ll have the IPA, please.” She accepted the wide glass he handed her and tasted the beer, hiding her attention in that small ritual of sipping, considering, and praise.

The younger woman — geneselected Hindi with the muscles an grace of a dancer–looked bored. She was clearly Spike Hair’s lover. Four other guests arrived and the Administrator greeted them easily and made introductions. Ahni filed the names in short term memory. Santos, the Argentinian businessman looked vaguely familiar. He had his young, decorative wife in tow, a platinum haired geneselect Scandinavian type. The other couple, both amer-mix men in their early thirties, seemed to be business partners rather than bed mates.

Interesting selection.

A couple of natives in plain blue singlesuits circulated with platters of small pastries and decoratively sliced fresh vegetables stuffed with herbed soy-cheese. Ahni nibbled and listened, hovering at the fringes of conversation. Complaints. Irritation. Service was poor, people were rude, shipments were being held up by disabled equipment and mistakes. The overall theme was… change. And not for the good. The business pair backed the Administrator up against the bar, complaining that their spider silk plant had dropped in production recently. They suspected theft among the native employees. Spike Hair was saying something about an epidemic of miscarriages and deformed infants up here. Ahni pricked her ears and drifted closer, thinking of Koi, but the wife-in-tow latched on to her, looking out of her depth and desperate and Ahni got to listen to a litany of small inconveniences and discomforts suffered on this, her first trip upside.

She didn’t know why her husband had to come up here personally. He usually handled this sort of new business on the Net.

That, too, was interesting. When you went from routine Net negotiations to personal conversations…

there was always a reason”Your gown is lovely– I’m jealous. What business is your husban in?” she asked with an admiring smile.

“Oh, he downports computer hardware. You know… the kind that they manufacture without any gravity. Boring stuff.” She rolled her eyes.

And that industry not only provided the current economic underpinning of NYUp, but was entirely controlled, she had discovered in her research, by a single downside corporation through several well disguised satellites. That fact… an economic vulneraability here… had caught her attention.

The other two downported spider silk and also represented Earth-based companies that leased space and local labor. And the Administrator had invited her when Huang downported nothing. Thoughtfully, Ahni followed the small assemblage as the Adminisstrator ushered them to the table set up at the far side of the large space. The in-tow wife claimed a seat beside Ahni.

“I went walking in one of the quaint parks.” She shook out her napkin and leaned close to Ahni. “These… children ran past. They said…” She blushed delicately and Ahni wondered if hubby had married her for her perfect, porcelain skin. “They said something very nasty. My friend said everyone was so nice to her, when she spent two weeks on the Indonesian platform. She didn’t have to lift a finger the whole time she was there. I don’t know why we had to come here.” She sounded aggrieved.

The wait staff served a delicate tomato broth as a first course, filling wine glasses with a cool crisp white wine without waiting to be asked. Ahni raised her glass to her lips, tasted it, and set it down again. Very nice California vintage. She noticed that her nearly full glass of beer had vanished, and that the staff topped up glasses as quickly as they emptied.

Ahni realized that the Administrator’s attention was on her and she lifted her full glass in a tiny salute. His lips curved briefly, then he turned to Spike Hair who was tapping urgently on his elbow with one perfectly inlaid and polished nail.

The soup had been removed and plates of sauteed fish and baby carrots lay before them accompanied by a salad of tiny greens. Ahni thought of the spider-like harvesters creeping along the tubes, their busy feet selecting, plucking…

“What about these rumors that the secession movement is getting out of control?” One of the silk manufacturers spoke up. “Our mannager says that skilled employees are getting harassed — told they should be working for our competitor because he’s local. I’ve lost a couple of talented design and dye-chemistry people.” He paused while the silent server refilled his wine glass, seized it. “I can’t just bring up downsiders. You got to run spider silk in microG modules. You bring people from down below and about the time they get good in micro they quit. My best designer and top chemist quit. It’s pressure.

From these NOW people.” He gulped half his fresh glass of wine. “They’re running off my best people.

What are you doing about them?” He glared at the Administrator.”Why the hell are you letting this get our of hand, Jones? Where the hell’s your Security?”

“Busy keeping track of the criminal element.” The Administraator smiled, rocking one long, dark hand gently in the air. “I did reespond to your complaint if you remember, Mr. Terrington. Your designer left of her own free will and applied for a job with Star Silk Co-op. There is nothing illegal about that. And your chemist is married to the designer. Are you surprised she followed her wife?”

“Bullshit!” Terrington stared morosely at his glass. “Yushi would never have deserted us. She was the creative talent that put us at the top of the market. She got leaned on.”

“That’s not what she told me.”

“They’re going to kick us all out.” Spike Hair’s drawl silence the table. “They’re going to start a revolution, herd us all into the climbers, or hell, maybe they’ll just push us all out the locks. Won t they, Mr. Jones-Egret, dearest?”

“Oh, my God, you’re kidding?” In-tow clasped her hands toogether charmingly.

“She’s not even kidding.” Her husband reached for his wine glass. “She’s drunk.”

Spike Hair’s decorative companion rolled her eyes and wen back to poking food around on her plate with the tines of her fork.

“There’s absolutely no worry about that.” The Administrator smiled reassuringly at the woman. “We have excellent Security up here.”

“And you have the North American Alliance’s military platform with those great big guns that they put up there expressly to shoot anybody up here who might think about doing anything they didn’t like,” Terrington’s business partner murmured.

“Of course.” Jones-Egret smiled. “So you’re perfectly safe.”

Terrington’s partner and in-tow’s husband were paying very close attention to this conversation.

Interesting. Ahni blinked their faces into short term memory. She’d run a search on them later.

”There is some… feeling that the orbitals should be independent. That’s true,” the Administrator was saying. “But it’s just a lot of hot air… people venting. The media on Earth is blowing it out of proportion.”

“Bunch of terrorists.” Terrington glared at his empty glass, transferred the glare to a woman who leaned over him to refill it. “I say send the CSF up here and clean the place out before those terrorists start dropping rocks on us.”

Silence gripped the table.

“How could rocks hurt?” In-tow asked.

Ahni thought she was playing the dumb blonde act a bit hard. She looked up and found the Administrator watching her, but he shifted his glance away quickly. Terrington was explaining in graphic detail just how rocks could hurt Earth and In-tow was doing a very nice job of shrinking in horror which seemed to please both hubby and Terrington equally. The other businessman, meanwhile, was carrying on a quiet conversation with Spike Hair. Ahni had realized some time ago that she wasn’t drunk at all.

Good acting. For whose benefit? By now the delicate creme brulee served for desert had been finished and the wait staff removed the plates.

The Administrator invited the guests to relax in a loose semicircle of comfortable smart chairs surrounding an actual open fire pit, although the logs were fake, Ahni noted. Brandy was served here, but the peak of the evening had passed and the businessman and his wife started the exodus. Terrington also stumbled off, complaining that they needed CSF up here to teach these spoiled hicks manners. Spike Hair’s bed mate also left, her demeanor sulky and feline.

Ahni, Terrington’s partner, and Spike Hair settled in with their brandies.

“You were very quiet tonight.” The Administrator smiled at Ahni. “I hope we didn’t bore you?”

“Oh, not at all,” Ahni said lightly. “I don’t know anything about the platforms so it was all very interesting.”

“You traveled on the climber with Mr. and Mrs. Santos.” He contemplated his brandy. Did you have a good trip?”

The connection finally closed. Santos was a Small Family member of Pacific Fisheries, the huge NAA conglomeration. He had had dealings with Huang Family.

“I did have a good trip,” she gave him a bland smile. “But of course, my brother dealt with Senor Santos.

I never actually met him.”

“Of course.” The Administrator swirled the brandy in his glass, his eyes fixed on the climb of the amber liquid up the curve of the glass.

Everyone’s attention was fixed on their brandies.

She didn’t know the password here. “I think it’s time for Huang to look up,” she said lightly. “My father has been stubborn about avoiding commerce with the platforms. But I am more… open to new connections.”

Clean miss. Their collective lack of response made her wince. Damn.

“You’ll have to forgive me.” The Administrator gave her an apologetic smile that hid irritation. “I have not met your brother. But I’m delighted to hear that Huang Family is interested in exploring a trade relationship with us up here.” He shifted his glance briefly to Spike Hair.

“Great dinner you put on. You guys are doing better and better with the hydroponic stuff.” The woman drained her brandy snifter and stretched. “I’d better be off. I’ve got business in Europe to deal with and their morning comes pretty damn soon now. Nice meeting you.” She nodded to the spidersilk manufacturer and to Ahni. “See you around.”

The Administrator rose, too, and so did the spidersilk manufacturer.

Meeting adjourned. Ahni let the Administrator usher her out to the entrance and the cart that waited to transport her to her hotel. Spike Hair had already vanished, but the spidersilk manufacturer hung back as Jones-Egret handed her into the cart. Everyone made pleasantries, and as the cart did a U-turn and headed down the corridor toward her hotel room, Ahni saw the Administrator and the manufacturer step back into the room. The meeting hadn’t been adjourned after all. Ahni wondered if Spike Hair would return, too.

Ahni rode in silence to her hotel, slipped a generous cash card onto the driver’s seat as the woman hopped down to hand her out. Her doorman with the red cornrows was back on duty. She caught his spike of attention as he recognized her, loitered a bit as the cart wheeled away.

“Your flowers,” he said softly as he bowed her through the door. “Dragon Home by a private courier.”

Ahni nodded without speaking, slipped a cash card into the man’s hand. “I would like to know the identity of anyone interested in me.” She didn’t wait for his nod, passed through the door and crossed the inner atrium, beneath an Earthly full moon and Milky Way. Northern hemisphere constellations on this platform, of course. Her door opened for her, warm yellow light filled the room, and soft cello murmured in the background. Someone had turned her bed down, left a single tiny rosebud and a chocolate on the pilllow. She sniffed it, smiled at the pheromone load. Laced with a transitory chip so that the hotel could keep track of her. She dropped it into recycle, left her sandals near the door and sat down crosslegged on the dense rug, the spider silk whispering against her skin. Dropped into Pause, the room vanishing.

Searched for a public acccess for Li Zhen. Found one. “Honored cousin, Li Zhen, I wish to thank you for your so very lovely flowers,” she said in precise Beiijing Mandarin, using all the traditional flourishes of antique etiquette. “You do me much more honor than my worthless self deserves. I humbly wish to express my gratitude to you in person, and perhaps chat about your friend, my esteemed brother Xai Huang. At your convenience. And again, I humbly thank you for your lovely gift of these flowers.”

She ended the link, then began to research the platform secession movement. Too bad she hadn’t guessed the open sesame for the meeting this evening. She would like to be a fly on the wall right now.

Negotiations for post-secession trade? The orbital lobby for independence had been gaining ground with the World Council. What did it have to do with Xai? Too tired to think anymore, she let her clothes puddle around her feet, climbed under the silk commforter and pulled it over her. Before she could even turn over, she was asleep.